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AGAINST ALL ODDS - Paul Connolly - John Blake Publishing 15th March
Ł7.99
<Download a copy of the release here>
Buy
it now at Amazon at: -
http://tinyurl.com/PCTheBook
Paul Connolly is a
celebrity fitness trainer and encourages his clients to enjoy the
physical and mental gains of regular physical exercise. Yet the reality
for him is that exercise gave him the chance to escape the mental shadow
cast by growing up in the infamous St Leonard’s Children’s home in East
London.
Paul now runs a successful Personal Training Business, is the creator of
Boxerobics and happily lives with his partner and two sons in
Essex – although this is a far cry
from his abandonment at two weeks old.
All seven of his siblings were
also rejected by his parents when Paul was taken into care but his
mother perversely would not allow him to be adopted. Vulnerable already,
“every child in care has the realisation at an early age that they are
utterly alone in the world and nobody even cares whether you live or not”
worse was to come when at the age of 7 he was moved to St Leonard’s.
In 2001 house parent ‘Uncle Bill’ was found guilty of rape and indecent
assault on children in his care and Principal of the home, Alan Prescott
found guilty of indecent assault during their time in charge of the
home. Shockingly Paul was told by the police prior to the trial that, of
the eight children in his dormitory, six were dead (“several by slow
suicide in the form of heroin abuse and at least two by faster means”)
and that his best friend at the home, Liam, had jumped under a train.
While Paul suffered physical abuse and a near starvation diet worse for
him was the ceaseless verbal abuse (“you’re rubbish, you Irish lowlife
scum. Prison fodder from the day you were born, nobody ever loved you”)
which was repeated so often like a mantra that he began to believe it
was true and to react by becoming aggressive and violent.
For Paul salvation came in the form of boxing. While other
contemporaries from the home were in trouble for mugging and street
violence he was ‘beating up’ people in the boxing ring and getting
praise and medals in exchange. It also meant he had no interest in
alcohol or drugs and via the club had the beginnings of a support
network. He became an amateur boxing champion winning local and national
titles.
Unfortunately an accident on a building site that almost severed his
right arm put paid to his hopes of becoming
a professional but, while in rehabilitation, he found he had an
aptitude for fitness training.
After becoming a trainer at a top London club he devised Boxerobics
which quickly became hugely popular. Paul was invited to be the boxing
expert on the pilot for the video, Elle Macpherson’s The Body which is
still one of the best-selling exercise videos of all time.
Paul was featured across the media including The Sun and Cosmopolitan.
Life had certainly changed, “it seemed surreal to be writing for
magazines when just a few years earlier I had to submit myself to the
embarrassment of an adult literacy course”.
 Most recently he has been training Chantelle Houghton who has already
lost a stone in body fat, drastically changed her eating habits and says
she is feeling the best she has in years.
Paul is currently working with Sweet Science Fitness -
www.sweetscience-fitness.co.uk the voluntary organisation who are
taking boxing coaches into schools in London to teach non-contact boxing
with the aim of improving physical fitness but also, hopefully, reducing
knife crime and bullying by teaching the benefits, via boxing, of hard
work, discipline and self-reliance.
Buy it now at Amazon at: -
http://tinyurl.com/PCTheBook
For further information or interview please contact Tony Fitzpatrick –
tony@peoplematter.tv
More information at:
www.fitnessexpert.tv and
www.esssextraining.com
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